tecoyah

This is likely to become a really cool adventure in the near future.....hopefully bringing to us some amazing discoveries, possibly groundshaking. There is the possibility (however slim) of living chemistry under the orange haze. I will add to this thread on a regular basis, as information comes to light, and discoveries are made..............My god.....its full of stars.

http://www.rednova.com/news/stories/.../story002.html



UC Berkeley -- On Jan. 14, 2005, the Huygens probe will plow into the orange atmosphere of Saturn's moon, Titan, becoming the first spacecraft to attempt to land on a moon in our solar system since the Soviet Union's Luna 24 touched down on Earth's moon in 1976.

Though scientists hope that Huygens will survive the plunge, it will be flying blind through hydrocarbon haze and methane clouds to a surface that could consist of seven-kilometer-high ice mountains and liquid methane seas.

That's the picture that emerges from a series of articles - half of them by University of California, Berkeley, researchers - published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters last month and detailing what scientists know to date about the surface, atmosphere and magnetic field of Titan. This view sets the stage for an analysis of new data soon to arrive from the Cassini spacecraft and Huygens probe.

"These (journal) papers really give a state-of-the-art picture of Titan, before Cassini goes into orbit around Saturn and the Huygens probe goes into Titan's atmosphere," said Imke de Pater, a professor of astronomy at UC Berkeley who wrote the introductory paper in the series and co-authored four of the nine papers.

The papers came out of a meeting De Pater hosted last November at UC Berkeley to discuss what has been gleaned to date about the moon from optical, infrared and radar telescopes, including the Hubble Space Telescope and the twin Keck Telescopes in Hawaii.

Scientists expect the current sketchy picture of Titan's surface, totally obscured by clouds and haze, will much improve when the Cassini spacecraft, which is carrying the Huygens probe, starts an intense observation of Titan later this month.



While on-board infrared imaging cameras can pierce the cloud cover, however, they can only reveal bright and dark spots on the surface, which are difficult to interpret. What Huygens will encounter at Titan's surface will remain a mystery until the probe plops into an ocean or parachutes to solid ground.

"Based upon their spectral characteristics, the bright areas imaged by various Earth-bound telescopes and the Hubble Space Telescope could be a mixture of rock and water ice," de Pater said. Such a mixture appears relatively bright in comparison with substances like tar and liquid hydrocarbons, which absorb essentially all sunlight at these wavelengths and hence appear very dark.

"The dark areas could contain liquid hydrocarbons," she said. "But they're all still a mystery."

Some scientists have suggested that one large bright area, Xanadu, is a mountain of rock and water ice that stands out because runoff (hydrocarbon rain) has washed off the dark hydrocarbon particles.

UC Berkeley graduate student J. Taylor Perron and de Pater concluded in one of the papers that such an ice continent, primarily composed of water ice, could be no higher than 3 to 7 kilometers - that is, at most, 23,000 feet, about the height of Mt. Aconcagua in Argentina. That is even more impressive on a globe less than half the diameter of Earth.

The Huygens probe, which will take from two to two and a half hours to float to the surface, is aiming for a landing site in a dark area bordering a bright area near the equator, so it could land instead in a gasoline-like hydrocarbon brew of methane, propane or butane.

Though the probe is designed to float, its builders expect, at most, 45 minutes of data once it sets down. A few minutes would be cause for celebration.


The Cassini/Huygens spacecraft was launched from Kennedy Space Center in 1997, the product of an international collaboration between three space agencies - the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space agency - involving contributions from 17 nations. It arrived at Saturn in July 2004, beginning a four-year mission to photograph and collect data on Saturn, its rings and moons.

This Oct. 26, it will get within 1,000 kilometers of Titan - closer than ever before - turning its remote sensing instruments on that moon's surface and atmosphere. Cassini will release the Huygens probe on Christmas Day, Dec. 25.

The second largest moon in the solar system and the only one with a thick, methane-rich, nitrogen atmosphere, Titan intrigues scientists because of its resemblance to a young Earth. The atmospheres of both Titan and the early Earth were dominated by nearly the same amount of nitrogen, and the chemistry discovered on Titan could provide clues to the origins of life on our planet.

De Pater and chemistry graduate student Mate Adamkovics have used the adaptive optics on the Keck Telescope in Hawaii to image the hydrocarbon haze that envelops the moon, taking snapshots at various altitudes from 150 to 200 kilometers down to the surface. In the movie they constructed from these snapshots, haze is very evident in the atmosphere at about 30-50 kilometers over the South Pole.

Stratospheric haze at about 150 kilometers is visible over a large area in the northern hemisphere but not the southern hemisphere, an asymmetry observed previously. And at the southern hemisphere's tropopause - the border between the lower atmosphere and the stratosphere at about 42 kilometers altitude - cirrus haze is visible, analogous to cirrus haze on Earth.

These observations agree with a theory of haze formation whereby sunlight creates haze particles at a high altitude - 400 to 600 kilometers above the surface - that are blown to the winter pole, where the haze accumulates as a polar "hood." The haze particles start to settle out and are carried by a lower-elevation return flow to the summer hemisphere.

Laboratory experiments by Melissa Trainer of the University of Colorado, Boulder, reported in the journal suggest that the haze particles could be polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons if the methane concentration in the atmosphere is high - around 10 percent - though they would be primarily long-chain hydrocarbons at low concentrations.

The Huygens probe will measure gas concentrations as it plummets through the atmosphere, hopefully testing this connection between methane concentration and aerosol composition.

Cassini's observations of Titan over the next four years should yield much more information about the atmospheric haze and surface topography, as well as raise new questions. De Pater urges ground-based astronomers to continue to observe Titan's moon, "so the Cassini/Huygens data can be tied in with the long-term data base on Titan's seasons," she wrote.

De Pater herself will be peering at Titan through the Keck Telescope on Jan. 15 when the Huygens probe disappears into the atmosphere.

"I'm skeptical that we'll see a meteor trail, as some have predicted, but our observations will give us a good image of Titan at the time of probe entry, which could be very relevant to calibrating Titan at entry time," de Pater said.

De Pater's research is supported by the National Science Foundation. The Nov. 17, 2003, workshop on Titan was sponsored by the Center for Integrative Planetary Studies at UC Berkeley.

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tropple

Hmmm...

I don't think the masters will like being disturbed....

(Robert Heinlein's, "The Puppet Masters")

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LeviticusMky

What happens if we find life down there?

Maybe I'm over-optomistic, but it seems that if life can survive through all the crap this earth has put it through, that it could evolve on some other planet...

Of course, that would also disprove any "earth centrist" religious creation theory...

I wonder what would happen if life were found there?
I can't wait, I hope the probe doesn't crash-land!

tecoyah

While there is a small chance of life on Titan, I would hope we have evolved to the point where even the most fundy of us would accept the new data, and adjust the religion to compensate....after all thats what has been done for thousands of years already. Recent understanding of extreme life forms here on Earth have made the likelyhood of life on Titan and Europa seem possible, if not relatively likely, as life seems to take hold wherever it can. It will indeed be wonderful to find life this early in the game....but myself, I think it is inevitable.

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blar

interesting

but i think we have a better chance at finding life on europa then titan

if we find life (if we have not already ) what will we do??

Forsaken

Great info. Keep us up to date...

reiii

I saw that on slashdot, I think this is so damned cool, I cant wait for the probe to land.

A note about the "polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons " you mentioned: I heard speculation that the cyclic aromatics in question were clouds of polystyrene, which would be pretty damned cool, because polystyrene is foam, and I think foam clouds a would be pretty bad ass.

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jwoody

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html



Explanation: Normally hidden by a thick, hazy atmosphere, tantalizing features on Titan's surface appear in this false-color view. The image was recorded as the Cassini spacecraft approached its first close flyby of Saturn's smog-shrouded moon on October 26. Here, red and green colors represent specific infrared wavelengths absorbed by Titan's atmospheric methane while bright and dark surface areas are revealed in a more penetrating infrared band. Ultraviolet data showing the extensive upper atmosphere and haze layers is seen as blue. Sprawling across the 5,000 kilometer wide moon, the bright continent-sized feature known as Xanadu is near picture center, bordered at the left by contrasting dark terrain. Saturn orbiter Cassini and Titan lander Huygens plan further explorations, but for now the origin and nature of Titan's surface features remain unknown.

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This is one the coolest APOD's in a while.

Drider_it

hmm sorry ive lost all faith on nasa and space exploration with in the last 10 years. i'll stick with movies. after the constant crashes and destruction.. why can nasa just give Hal 12 million and call it a success?

but really my greatest fear of all is these peps look at it like this.. and i swear they do..

It looked good on paper and a computer model. they get one success and they will want to bring something back in the future. granted all the wonderful bugs that inhabit our bodies and world (virus im talking of when i say bugs) they bring something back like that .. the world wlll end heh.

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mrdarcy

I don't see where finding any other life anywhere in our solar system disproves any "earth centrist" religious creation theory.

As far as what would happen? Well, we would find something on the news besides the elections and the upcoming recounts. Then we would get into an argument (again) as to what is life, and if it IS life, is it plant or animal or other.
Then we would get our panties in a knot to find MORE life and to explore farther into space, and then we would make even bigger plans and dream even bigger dreams,
and then we wouldn't fund any of it, and what little funding that we did give it would be wasted,
and we'd sit at home and type in forums about what a pity it all is.

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tecoyah

Here are the latest images of the surface....nothing conclusive, but quite interesting none the less.
http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=100735


Saturn's moon Titan shows a sharp contrast between its smooth and rough edges in a new false-color radar image.

Titan's surface lies beneath a thick coat of hazy clouds, but Cassini's radar instrument can peer through to show finer surface features. Scientists have added color to emphasize finer details on Titan, as shown in the image.


Brighter areas may correspond to rougher terrains, slopes facing the radar, or different materials. The pink colors enhance smaller details on the surface, while the green color represents smoother areas. Winding linear features that cut across dark areas may be ridges or channels, although their nature is not yet understood. A large dark circular feature is seen at the western (top left) end of the image, but very few features on Titan resembling fresh impact craters are seen.

The area shown is in the northern hemisphere of Titan and is about 150 kilometers (93 miles) wide by 300 kilometers (186 miles) long. The image is a part of a larger strip created from data taken on Oct. 26, 2004, when the Cassini spacecraft flew approximately 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) above Titan's surface. The radar instrument works by bouncing radio signals off Titan's surface and timing their return. This is similar to timing the returning echo of your voice across a canyon to tell how wide the canyon is. Approximately 1 percent of Titan's surface was mapped during the Oct. 26 flyby.

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tecoyah

Looks like a possible Ice volcano on the surface of Titan....

http://www.rednova.com/news/display/?id=101616

Cassini Spots Possible 'Ice Volcano' On Titan
This synthetic aperture radar image of the surface of Saturn's moon Titan shows a possible ice volcano. Credit: NASA/JPLL
Jet Propulsion Lab -- A strikingly bright feature that is consistent with an active geology has been seen in one of Cassini's first radar images of Saturn's moon Titan. There are many possibilities for what it is but one of the leading candidates is that it may be a 'cryovolcanic' flow or 'ice volcano'.

"It may be something that flowed," said Cassini radar team member Dr. Ralph Lorenz of the University of Arizona, Tucson. "Or it could be something carved by erosion. It's too early to say.

"But it looks very much like it's something that oozed across the surface. It may be some sort of cryovolcanic flow, an analog to volcanism on Earth that is not molten rock but, at Titan's very cold temperatures, molten ice."

A radar image is available at http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov and http://www.nasa.gov/cassini .

Cassini's radar mapped about one percent of Titan's surface during the spacecraft's first close Titan flyby on Oct. 26. The radar survey covered a strip 120 kilometers (75 miles) wide and 1,960 kilometers (1,200 miles) long in Titan's northern hemisphere.

Cassini was flying about 2,494 (1,550 miles) above Titan's surface, with its radar centered at about 45 degrees north, 30 degrees west, when it mapped the 230-square-kilometer (90-square- mile) area shown in the new radar image. The Cassini radar team presented the image yesterday at the 36th annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences in Louisville, Ky.

The radar instrument on board Cassini works by bouncing radio signals off Titan's surface and timing their return. The more signal reflected back to the spacecraft, the brighter the imaged area. Turning radio signals into radar images is time consuming because so many numerical calculations must be made. "There's no such thing as a 'raw' radar image," said Lorenz.

Just two days after the Oct. 26 flyby, Cassini scientists knew that Titan is not a crater-pocked dead world, but a much more interesting place. Titan's surface is young. It might have been altered by ongoing dynamic geologic processes that cover and obscure old impact craters. Lorenz, and Cassini interdisciplinary scientist Dr. Jonathan Lunine also of the University of Arizona, and other Cassini scientists, agree in this interpretation.

Given this newest image, Lunine said, "Cassini's radar has provided the first evidence for possible young cryovolcanism on Titan's surface. Now our challenge is to find out what is flowing, how it works, and the implications for Titan's evolution."

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tecoyah

Two days and counting to landfall. Should be one hell of a ride, possibly a few groundbreaking suprises.

Do you think:

We land in liquid, and see nothing special?

We land on rock, and see nothing special?

We land in liquid, and are in for a suprise?

We land on rock, and are in for a suprise?

The freakin' thing blows up before it even hits the surface?

We land in the middle of a Titanian slug creature Tea Party?

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Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha

slimshaydee

I reckon the things stacks

ICER

I vote for the "We land in the middle of a Titanian slug creature Tea Party?" option

no really, I think it well land in in liquid, and are in for a suprise.

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Schwan

Same here. Liquid & surprise. I hope!

TexanAvenger

I just hope like hell that it doesn't have a conversion error and fall from the sky... What'll the Titans think of us if we can't even land our own instruments?

I too hope there's some kind of life hiding down there, but throw a lot more of my hope towards Europa.

ObieX

I too vote Europa for our next stop - dere be water uner dat ice, i tell you wut.

After watching that spacecraft that was sent to collect solar particle samples fall from the sky live on NASA TV im on the edge of my seat in anticipation to see what is going to happen with the Titan probe. This one was made by the European Space Agency (the cassini part of the craft was made by NASA, the Huygens probe the ESA) and will hopefully do a better job with paracute deployment.

As for what i think we will see, i think we wont see as much liquid as we would like on the surface, and won't get much of a suprise of any kind (unfortunately). However, i am very excited to see what will happen, and have been following this mission for quite some time now. There have been some truly amazing pictures of both Saturn, Saturn's rings, and Saturn's moons so far already. Personally i was expecting the mission to fail when i heard the spacecraft had to fly THROUGH the rings to get into orbit in the first place. I like the audio file NASA put out that let you listen to the craft as it flew through the rings. You could hear all the little particles smashing into the spacecraft - it was awesome.

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tecoyah

Here is the timeline for the probe.....

Time (CET) Event
5.44 Timer triggers power-up of onboard electronics
Triggered by a pre-set timer, Huygens's onboard electronics power up and the transmitter is set into low-power mode, awaiting the start of transmission.
10.06 Huygens reaches 'interface altitude'
The 'interface altitude' is defined as 1270 kilometres above the surface of the moon where entry into Titan's atmosphere takes place.
10.10 Pilot parachute deploys
The parachute deploys when Huygens detects that it has slowed to 400 metres per second, at about 180 kilometres above Titan's surface. The pilot parachute is the probe's smallest, only 2.6 metres in diameter. Its sole purpose is to pull off the probe's rear cover, which protected Huygens from the frictional heat of entry.

2.5 seconds after the pilot parachute is deployed, the rear cover is released and the pilot parachute is pulled away. The main parachute, which is 8.3 metres in diameter, unfurls.
10.11 Huygens begins transmitting to Cassini and front shield released
At about 160 kilometres above the surface, the front shield is released.

42 seconds after the pilot parachute is deployed, inlet ports are opened up for the Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer and Aerosol Collector Pyrolyser instruments, and booms are extended to expose the Huygens Atmospheric Structure Instruments.

The Descent Imager/Spectral Radiometer will capture its first panorama, and it will continue capturing images and spectral data throughout the descent. The Surface Science Package will also be switched on, measuring atmospheric properties.
10.25 Main parachute separates and drogue parachute deploys
The drogue parachute is 3 metres in diameter. At this level in the atmosphere, about 125 kilometres in altitude, the large main parachute would slow Huygens down so much that the batteries would not last for the entire descent to the surface. The drogue parachute will allow it to descend at the right pace to gather the maximum amount of data.
10.42 Surface proximity sensor activated
Until this point, all of Huygens's actions have been based on clock timers. At a height of 60 kilometres, it will be able to detect its own altitude using a pair of radar altimeters, which will be able to measure the exact distance to the surface. The probe will constantly monitor its spin rate and altitude and feed this information to the science instruments. All times after this are approximate.
11.50 Gas Chromatograph Mass Spectrometer begins sampling atmosphere
This is the last of Huygens's instruments to be activated fully. The descent is expected to take 137 minutes in total, plus or minus 15 minutes. Throughout its descent, the spacecraft will continue to spin at a rate of between 1 and 20 rotations per minute, allowing the camera and other instruments to see the entire panorama around the descending spacecraft.
12.23 Descent Imager/Spectral Radiometer lamp turned on
Close to the surface, Huygens's camera instrument will turn on a light. The light is particularly important for the 'Spectral Radiometer' part of the instrument to determine the composition of Titan's surface accurately.
12.27 Surface touchdown
This time may vary by plus or minus 15 minutes depending on how Titan's atmosphere and winds affect Huygens's parachuting descent. Huygens will hit the surface at a speed of 5-6 metres per second. Huygens could land on a hard surface of rock or ice or possibly land on an ethane sea. In either case, Huygens's Surface Science Package is designed to capture every piece of information about the surface that can be determined in the three remaining minutes that Huygens is designed to survive after landing.
14.37 Cassini stops collecting data
Huygens's landing site drops below Titan's horizon as seen by Cassini and the orbiter stops collecting data. Cassini will listen for Huygens's signal as long as there is the slightest possibility that it can be detected. Once Huygens's landing site disappears below the horizon, there's no more chance of signal, and Huygens's work is finished.
15.07 First data sent to Earth
Cassini first turns its high-gain antenna to point towards Earth and then sends the first packet of data.

The time for the signal to travel from Titan to Earth then takes 67 minutes.

Getting data from Cassini to Earth is now routine, but for the Huygens mission, additional safeguards are put in place to make sure that none of Huygens's data are lost. Giant radio antennas around the world will listen for Cassini as the orbiter relays repeated copies of Huygens data.


All times above are the times that the actual events occur on the spacecraft.

http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Cassini-...YGQ3K3E_0.html

Link is updated by ESA

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ObieX

All of this will be covered on NASA TV (which can also be viewed streaming online). More info and the schedule can be found here: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasat..._Breaking.html

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tecoyah

The probe should now be on the surface....or at least floating pretty close.
Cant wait for the results.

A piggyback probe called Huygens was bolted to Cassini and has been riding along during the nearly seven-year journey to Saturn largely in a "sleep" mode. The probe descent will begin at 4:07 AM on January 14, EST (USA), and its Descent Imager experiment hopes to have a couple of images taken during the descent ready that evening. Huygens will be the first human-made object to explore on-site the unique environment of Titan, whose chemistry is assumed to be very similar to that of early Earth before life formed.

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Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha

Pacifier

Well it seems that the probe is on its way down

http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Cassini-...EPQ3K3E_0.html

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"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
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tecoyah

probe is alive....signal recieved.
looks like mission success thus far

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appleseed

Cool link Obie. I just came in to post that it was on the way down, but you guys are quicker than me!

Pacifier

the mission seems to be a full success:

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMQ1QQ3K3E_index_0.html

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"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
— Albert Einstein

degrawj

this is sweet. thank you for providing this thread tecoyah. i was going to when i got home from work this morning, but you had already done it for me! it's pretty awesome to see that other people are as interested in this as you and i are. i'm still in awe at how we can accomplish something like this. it just blows my mind. and then once we start examining all the information, it blows my mind even more. totally awesome.

Schwan

I can't wait for the pics. No, really, I can't. I've got a shitload of work, and all I'm doing is sitting in front of the computer and mashing the "refresh" button continuosly.

degrawj

Well, this particular mission was done by the European Space Agency, which has had quite a bit more success than NASA in the last couple years.

ObieX

I can't wait to see the first pictures either. I've been waiting for this for a long time now

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Schwan

I bring you.... TITAN! Or something else.

Granted, it's 16 km from the ground. None the less, first pic.

UPDATE: First surface pic.



UPDATE: http://www.lpl.arizona.edu/%7Ekholso/data.htm has very raw images from the probe. It's interesting how very similar the surface seems to Mars!

degrawj

well, so far i am fairly impressed by the pictures! very cool.

Shpoop

looks like the images are down... i cant see them

tecoyah

The first Pic is likely rivers, and a shoreline...according to scientists.
Fuck an "A"........beautiful.

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splck

Here's a couple more pics

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nice line eh?

ObieX

Wondering if those are actual waves along the coast in the pictures or if they are islands or under-liquid sand bars of a kind. I imagine with the huge gravitational pull of Saturn and the other moons in the Saturn system there would have to be some wicked surf there.

Who knows, maybe in the year 2205 people will be surfing there.

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Pacifier

another image



This is one of the first raw images returned by the ESA Huygens probe during its successful descent.It was taken at an altitude of 8 kilometres with a resolution of 20 metres per pixel. It shows what could be the landing site, with shorelines and boundaries between raised ground and flooded plains.

__________________
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
— Albert Einstein

Pacifier

The Sound of Titan

http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multime...nal_Decent.mp3

http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multime...ter_Impact.mp3

The first file, made during the descent, includes a 'lot of acoustic noise', according to Peter Falkner from the HASI science team. The second, made after landing, features only silence; the sound that can be heard is merely electronic noise from an on-board amplifier.

More pics:


hi-res


hi-res


hi-res


hi-res

__________________
"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere. Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death
— Albert Einstein

Schwan

I've been waiting for these sound bits. There's certainly something special in listening to what's going on in a different world - even though it might seem you can't hear anything! The descent mp3 in inaudible, though it does seem as if there was some kind of a musical beat there (I know, the machinery). I', sure you can hear the hiss of the wind in the second sound bit.

Does anyone know if these pictures are as good as it gets? Or will there be any high-res, color ones, like the ones from Mars?

:::OshnSoul:::

so amazing, I save some incredible pics of Saturn & Titan:


You notice trails like reserviours/rivers leading to some form of body of water.


Saturn's rings


Titan- our next home?


Clear view of Saturn


Saturn and its child


Titan's atmosphere


Side view of Saturn

degrawj

oh man, i love this this stuff!! my mind is about to explode!